oil booms
Floating petroleum barriers
Oil booms are floating barriers used to contain oil spills on water, preventing the slick from spreading to shorelines or sensitive areas.
They consist of buoyant material that rides the surface while a skirt extends below to block oil movement: Crews deployed oil booms around the harbor within hours of the spill.
The term also describes periods of economic expansion driven by petroleum discovery or production: The Texas oil boom of the early 1900s transformed the state.
- boomsRumbles or upswings
- absorbentAble to soak up
- containmentPreventing hostile expansion
- spillAccidental liquid release
- floatBuoyant object or vehicle
Gulf Coast · barrier · resource extraction · wildlife rescue · offshore platforms · pollution control · sheen · commodity markets · slick · environmental monitoring · energy markets · offshore · tarballs · tanker · harbor · cleanup · recovery · anchors
- petroleumcrude, oilfields, kerosene, diesel fuel, gasoline
- oil spillstar balls, skimmer, skimmers, cleanup, cleanup crew
- spill cleanupabsorbent, absorbent pads, spill kit, skimmer, dispersant
- American HistoryAmerican Revolution, Revolutionary War, colonial era, founding fathers, Declaration of Independence
- ocean pollutionplastic pollution, marine debris, plastic waste, toxic waste, chemical spills
- economic historystock market crash, Industrial Revolution, trade routes, Great Depression, gold standard